Cain believes that 1/3 of African-Americans would vote for him in a general election. I think he might exceed that.

He also says that he could support Mitt Romney if he means it about ObamaCare repeal, and that he could not support Rick Perry if he were the nominee based on his immigration- and border-related positions.

(Note: Very smart. Besides being principled, he disses the guy who’s stronger [Perry], and throws a bone at the guy who not only isn’t [Romney], but who will also never be convincing in his promise to repeal ObamaCare.)

Crunch the numbers and you realize that if Cain gets only 30% of the African-American vote instead of 1/3, and assuming a slightly lower African-American turnout due to a general pullback by younger people (15 million vs. 2008′s 15.9 million), Obama’s margin in the African-American community would shrink from 14.3 million to 6 million (hard to believe, but true, because McCain got only 5%). That 8.3 million vote difference is about 87% of Obama’s entire 9.7 million vote victory margin over John McCain in 2008.

Barack Obama would have to get a bit over 47% of the rest of the population to pull off a squeaker in the popular vote; he only got 48% in 2008. Though 13-1/2 months is forever in politics, based on the realities on the ground right now, there’s no way Barack Obama would get that today.

You can play it below (weak quality, but good enough for evaluation purposes; should go to a separate tab or window; the “suspend elections for Congress” suggestion is at about the 0:33 mark; HTs to Drudge and the Daily Caller):

UPDATE 2: This is such a damning story that it still isn’t at the Associated Press’s main national news site. In AP’s unbylined local North Carolina story from last night at 9:54 p.m. (no way this is a national story [/sarc]), the headline reads: “Governor Perdue Jokes about Congressional Elections.” Today’s audio doesn’t lie; no she wasn’t.

Any bets on whether AP will do an accurate update?

UPDATE 3: Rush Limbaugh, who has gone to posting transcripts of his show and other helpful items in near-real time at his web site, elaborates –

… No laughter. No applause, either, but there was no laughter; there’s no jocularity there. This effort to say that she was just kidding is gonna fall flat because she wasn’t. She was dead serious.

… If they could get away with canceling elections, they would do it. That is who the Democrats of today are. That’s what the American left is all about.

… The Constitution doesn’t matter. Look at what the definition of “helping the country recover” is. Now, somebody sent me an e-mail, Rush: “Why would she do this? If they’re canceling the election she’s guaranteeing a huge Republican majority.” Well, they’re in a world of hurt. She wants to cancel the elections because 2012 could dwarf 2010 in terms of Republican victory/Democrat loss. What could happen in November next year… I’ll tell you if the election were in one month or two months, the Democrat Party would end up with the smallest number of elected representatives in the House of Representatives maybe in history.

This is John Frank, a political reporter at the News & Observer. I saw you picked up on Gov. Perdue’s remarks. The original headline was “Perdue suggest suspending Congressional elections for two years — was she serious?” It was updated later in the day to reflect the new information we received from the governor’s office, which called it “hyperbole.” Joke was used to suggest she wasn’t serious in the headline. I didn’t put joke in quotes though. I can assure you there is no case of bias — and folks on the Democratic and Republican side were both up in arms about the story/remarks.

The audio didn’t get posted until this morning because we had to edit it from a large file and it took the work of a few folks in the newsroom. Sorry we didn’t get it up faster.

I appreciate your interest in the story and thanks for reading. Let me know if you have any more questions.

John
John Frank
Staff Writer
The News & Observer

Sorry, John. No sale. If there were no bias, “joke” would have been in quotes. It wasn’t.

Because it wasn’t, a typical reader would take it to mean that it really was a joke. It wasn’t.

If you meant to communicate that Perdue or her peeps thought it was a joke, you would have put “joke” in quotes. You didn’t.

The excuse about the slow processing time for an obviously hot, time-sensitive audio is either pathetic or deceptive. Pathetic if, as I suspect, the audio involved was at the beginning of your recording of the event (likely, since you said that the audience member’s question “is not included on the tape because I didn’t flick my recorder on quickly enough”). Still pathetic, if RN&O couldn’t round anyone up to process audio pronto if you don’t know how to do it yourself. Deceptive, if you deliberately waited until this morning for the purpose of planting the seed that it was a joke (note that a local AP story bit on it last night) so that by the time we all found out that it really wasn’t it would be semi-old news.

To experience true nausea, check out Frank’s writeup of President Obama’s visit to North Carolina two weeks ago.

LightSquared — at The HIll (“LightSquared doubles size of its lobbying team in 2011″):

LightSquared, the wireless telecom firm facing Republican complaints that it has benefited from political ties to the White House, has significantly boosted its lobbying this year.

The company has more than doubled the number of lobbying firms on its payroll, from four to nine K Street shops, in the first half of 2011.

LightSquared has already spent $830,000 on lobbying in the first six months of year, and is on pace to more than double its K Street expenditures of $695,000 in 2010, according to lobbying disclosure records.

… The company is developing high-speed cellphone service using a network of satellites and land-based cell towers, and has been in a lobbying fight with the GPS industry.

After tests found that LightSquared’s network did interfere with GPS devices — a big concern for the U.S. military — the FCC decided the company would not get final approval for its network until the issue is resolved.

Jeff Carlisle, LightSquared’s executive vice president of regulatory affairs and public policy, told The Hill that GPS device-makers have decided to lobby heavily against LightSquared after it was found its network could interfere with their devices. He and LightSquared argue the problem has to do with GPS systems, not LightSquared.

Really? The GPS systems have been around for, what, close to a decade, and it’s their fault that their systems interferes with LightSquared’s?

On Beverly Perdue, many, including BizzyBlog commenters, have made the connection to following item former Obama Budget Director Peter Orszag wrote in the New Republic:

To solve the serious problems facing our country, we need to minimize the harm from legislative inertia by relying more on automatic policies and depoliticized commissions for certain policy decisions. In other words, radical as it sounds, we need to counter the gridlock of our political institutions by making them a bit less democratic

Relative to Ford, there’s this from Daniel Howes at the Detroit News yesterday (bolds are mine):

Ford Pulls Its Ads on Bailouts

For the only Detroit automaker that “didn’t take the money” of the federal auto bailouts, Ford Motor Co. keeps paying a price for its comparative success and self-reliant turnaround.

There’s no help from American taxpayers to help lighten its debt load, giving crosstown rivals comparatively better credit ratings and a financial edge Ford is working diligently to erase all on its own.

There’s no clause barring a strike by hourly workers amid this fall’s national contract talks with the United Auto Workers — a by-product of the taxpayer-financed bailout that General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group LLC retain until 2015.

And there’s no assurance the Dearborn automaker can use the commercially advantageous fact that it didn’t “take the money” proffered by the Obama Treasury Department and use it in TV ads angling to sell cars and trucks. Not if the campaign takes a whack at its Detroit rivals and suggests that Ford no longer supports the Obama administration bailouts it backed in public statements and sworn congressional testimony.

As part of a campaign featuring “real people” explaining their decision to buy the Blue Oval, a guy named “Chris” says he “wasn’t going to buy another car that was bailed out by our government,” according the text of the ad, launched in early September.

“I was going to buy from a manufacturer that’s standing on their own: win, lose, or draw. That’s what America is about is taking the chance to succeed and understanding when you fail that you gotta’ pick yourself up and go back to work.”

That’s what some of America is about, evidently. Because Ford pulled the ad after individuals inside the White House questioned whether the copy was publicly denigrating the controversial bailout policy CEO Alan Mulally repeatedly supported in the dark days of late 2008, in early ’09 and again when the ad flap arose. And more.

With President Barack Obama tuning his re-election campaign amid dismal economic conditions and simmering antipathy toward his stimulus spending and associated bailouts, the Ford ad carried the makings of a political liability when Team Obama can least afford yet another one. Can’t have that.

The ad, pulled in response to White House questions (and, presumably, carping from rival GM), threatened to rekindle the negative (if accurate) association just when the president wants credit for their positive results (GM and Chrysler are moving forward, making money and selling vehicles) and to distance himself from any public downside of his decision.

Of course, everyone’s circling the wagons now: “Ford, White House both deny pressure to pull advertisement criticizing government bailout.” Sure, Mr. Howes has nothing better to do than make up stories out of thin air.

This is how freedom slowly vanishes:

Businesses decide that doing business with the state beats trying to achieve legitimate success in the open market.

Thugs and thugs-in-waiting constantly test the waters to see how much thuggery and lawlessness the public will tolerate.

Businesses trying to succeed in the open market must constantly calculate just how far they can push the political class (and avoid regulatory visibility) before crossing the line.

This is not what our Founders envisioned. They also wouldn’t have expected the nation’s most dominant news organization to constantly look the other way as it all unfolds.

From Warroad, Minnesota — This isn’t realistic for every business. Also note that hours and pay cuts have occurred. But it’s nice to see one which so far has been able to do this:

Posted on September 26, 2011 at 10:00pm

Marvin Windows and Doors has been the biggest employer in the small town of Warroad, Minn. for nearly a century. During the housing slump, the private company has lost money, but the owners have vowed not to cut health benefits or layoff a single employee, reports Business Insider.

“Housing isn’t in a recession. It’s in a depression,” says Susan Marvin, the company’s president.

“While it’s challenging for our people right now, and not everybody understands all the reasons why, the alternatives are devastating. These people would have to pick up and leave,” Marvin said in a recent New York Times article.

“It’s always, ‘Next year it will turn around,’ ” he says. “It’s a challenge. No one thought we’d be where we are today, having not pulled out of [the recession].”

Marvin’s no-layoff announcement was originally cheered by employees, and in April 2009, Marvin and a Marvin employee were hailed as “great Americans” on national television, reports the Times.

However, much of that initial euphoria has worn off as the reality of smaller paychecks has materialized itself in the last three years.

Many employees have decided to take a second job. Marvin employee, Nathan Hoy, 30, is working a second job at the Warroad Municipal Liquor Store. His reduced hours at Marvin Windows have taken a toll. “You drive less, drink less, go out less often,” he said in the Times report.

“I’ve talked to other business people about it, and they have challenged it. They have challenged the wisdom of it,” Susan Marvin says referencing her company’s no-layoff promise.

However, they are sticking to their promise and refuse to cave because of hard times. …

z Pol-Party-Lobby Sites z

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